Hi all, I've just got hold of SO4 around 4 days ago, used to play SO original and SO2. over the last few days I must have restarted a new game a least 20 times as I'm having trouble getting a decent start without running out of money... I had thoughts of giving up on the Simulation as it is becoming frustrating just trying to start off well. I've been here reading a lot and it seems I'm not the only one that's had bad starts. I feel at this time the only way I'm going to get a start is by what some call cheating with ( Art-money ). its seems it's either this or give up, I said to my wife I don't really want to do things this way but hey.. I've really tried. I also saw a thread on here of people having trouble with getting SO4 on XP into windows mode, Mike explained it must be a data error so re-install. I've done this and guess what.. nothing has changed. SO4 will not drop to windows mode in XP
( well not on my PC ).

I just want a way to start, selling horses has not worked for me as I still run out of money. do I really need to cheat to get the start I need ?

Any help would be great .

Cheers Paul

If you're wanting a quick start then yes you will have to cheat. If you don't want to 'cheat' try starting a new game with 6 months auto days played and look for big priced winners in big handicaps, they do predominantly win. If you don't want to cheat then there is no quick fix, patience is required.

Hi neves-rats

I'm not really looking for a quick start but.. just a start of some kind so I can build on it. The last thing I want to do is to spoil a game I just paid for. you see I'm not the cheating kind. ( or do they call it a loan ) , Ok I'll try your ideas and thank you .

A way in which you can make money is looking for big distance winners in claimers, buy them cheap maybe give them 2 runs in better races and keep mark then put them back in claimer with you betting on them, if its cheap enough buy it again as it wont cost you nothing as its your horse. Do this for 1 season with 5 or 6 horses and should give you a nice little pot. Cant remeber telling you it was data error tho mate??? or was that a different Mike

a maybe simpler way to get a little fortune run my 5 horses find the nbest ones and sell the others gives u about 350,000. run them over jump fences so there rating goes up quite a bit while preserving the hurdle rating run them in top chases so there jumps figures are 0000 then run in a low handicap hurdle usually get a good price i.e 10's or bigger and then win easy.

I sell all the original horses, I also do what Westy said and buy claimers which have won their claimers/sellers by a decent distance, you may only get 1 decent horse out of about 10 or so bought but it works, If your playing a jumps game with it look for horses which have won NHF races by over 5 lengths or so, I managed to find a 4 time Champion hurdle winner doing that... If you do get a decent horse as well don't aim for the classics just yet you will get that through breeding, aim for the races with the big pots i.e. dubai/breeders cup/melbourne cup/triple crown races etc. Even the place money is huge over a million at some points so even if your horses aren't at that level chuck them in as you never know, once you get to about 5 million and find a decent breeding mare or two it should be smooth sailing. Or again as Mikey said run them at completely the wrong distances then chuck it in a very low handicap and steam in at a big price, that works as well sometimes, everyone has problems starting, it's luck really... Took me about 5 or 6 games before I got lucky, some take more some less!

Hi mwesty1, Thanks for the advise, I will give this a go sounds like a good idea to try. Sorry I got the name wrong about the data error it was
Mark Loveday who said this on another thread I was reading, still I'm not going to give in to Art money, its not how the game should be played, so windows mode in xp no longer matters to me



Hi Mikey1892

Again thanks for the advise, I made notes on both of you guys comments and I'm racing tonight, will let you know how things go.

Hi nick_driver, Its all makes sence got more notes down now, all you guys are a big help, I never expected all this advise . OK I'm off to put some of this in place.

Cheers Paul

The first time I played, I started and stopped several seasons. I just could not get any system to work. I tried buying cheap horses, betting on horses I thought would win, and a couple other ideas. But I always ran out of money.

I always tried to get to the breeding barn and sell the offspring. But there are usually several seasons in there where I'd have no horses left to run.

But then I got lucky. I won a big race in my 2nd season. That gave me the bankroll for the breeding barn and the money to get good bloodlines. Even then, it was a struggle. But I think I am in about 2035 and I have all the money I could possibly want now. After about 10 seasons, money means nothing.

I started a 2nd and 3rd season. In both of these seasons I have just transferred in horses from the previous season. Gives me good horses right away and good bloodlines right away. But even then I have had to use the ctrl-alt-del cheat at the beginning of the game just to get started.

Even my current season, I have about 10 million right now. But I've been at 10-15 million for about 3-4 years. But to get great horses you need to spend the 1M+ stud fees.

Hi jstu9, Your starting story sounds very much like what I've been through, I had the breeding barn up once then ran dry of cash with no horses to run etc.

Can I ask ( transferring horses ) is this the same as exporting ? not sure on this how its done.

I'm pleased to say I've just made my first £100000 with the help above, and have a couple of Claiming horses on the go. £100000 is probably a drop in the ocean to you guys but it a start, but the claiming rides are working, I'm taking it slow and watching my cash flow. OK back to the races, I hope I see you in the leagues in a few years time.

No, transferring and exporting are different things. I'm no expert so someone might be able to give you a fuller explanation but...

Exporting is for the Race Builder. Pretty much the main reason to export is either for use in the "League" or if you just wanted to test your horses at various tracks/distances/goings without actually running them in the game.

Transferring is actually transferring a horse from one saved game to the next. As for me, I wanted to play a new schedule and to do so, you need to start up a new game. So I transferred some horses over so I could use them.

It will probably be slow going at first. But as you slowly get better horses, you will slowly make more money and then you can breed better horses and then more money. And repeat. And sooner or later you will have all the money in the world and a bunch of great horses.

Hi jstu9, I understand now about the transferring.. so your copying and pasting files from one place to the next. On breeding is it right that I can use in game studs which are not mine, to get a better blood-line, or do I have to own the both the male and female pair, I don't see an option for selecting an in game stud which is not mine, unless my eyes are playing tricks with me.

At the top of the Breeding barn, there is a button "Include non-owned horses". That will give you a list of all the game controlled horses as well as your own.

Cheers jstu9, very helpful

Hi All, I would like to clarify my above statement for anyone with SO4 on windows XP. I read a thread saying to use ( Ctrl+Alt+ Delete keys ) to drop into windows XP, this is not actually correct as it will no work, for this to work you ( hold ALT and just tap the TAB ).

I'd like to end and say ( Don't use it ) I was tempted at first to cheat with art-money as I could not get a start and got kind of frustrated.

With the help I received from guys on here and making notes of it all I'm now doing very well on my own from scratch and I feel good about that when playing the game. I like to thank all the above members once more for giving me great advise.

Cheers Paul